Find the clothes…find the killer
The clothes that Theresa wore the night of November 3, 1978, were never recovered. If we could find them, they might yield some important pieces of evidence. (Anon sent me an article--reprinted below--about a case with some similarities to Theresa’s. The big difference is that the investigators collected the victim’s clothes, kept them as evidence and were able to get DNA evidence some 30 years later.)
Were these Theresa’s clothes?
“It is six o’clock on the morning of Sunday, November 5th, and hunters, Steve Mandigo and Samuel Burnham have been up for hours. ..This morning they have chosen a spot at the crest of a rise overlooking a spectacular view of Lake Memphremagog. It is beautiful country. The lakeshore is peppered with dozens of cottages belonging to the affluent members of the Montreal English elite. They come to unwind each summer, to this area near the tiny village of Austin.
"Late autumn. The lakeshore is now closed for the season. It is cold, but the first snow has yet to fall. Mandigo and Burnham pass silently through the thick, dense forest. They are hoping for deer. Near a fallen tree they spy something. They approach the tree. Resting neatly on a log they find clothing. Upon closer examination, they see that it’s a woman’s shirt and a pair of blue pants. The clothes look new. The men place the clothing back on the log and continue with their hunting. Around noon, the two men exit the interior of the forest. They come out onto the gravel service road where their trucks are parked. They briefly discuss the articles of clothing they found in the woods. They consider whether it would be best to notify the Police.” (Posted by John Allore on November 6, 2006)
Murder victim's clothes held critical clue for 30
years
New DNA evidence helps police pinpoint a suspect in the
1978 killing of Sara Beth Lundquist
By TRACY
JOHNSON
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Sara Beth Lundquist would be well into her 40s by now. The way she loved children, perhaps she'd have a few of her own. Maybe, just as she'd planned, she'd be a nurse.
Though her family will never know what the 15-year-old could have become, they're finally getting answers about who may have abducted her near a Ballard bus stop and stabbed her to death almost 30 years ago.
Seattle police say DNA evidence now points to Clarence E. Williams, who killed a young woman less than three months later. On Wednesday, King County prosecutors charged him with murdering Lundquist in 1978. He will be arraigned Nov. 7 in King County Superior Court.
"I feel like this is going to be healing. ... Having this question answered has got to bring some relief," said Lundquist's mother, Lynne Carlson, who still lives in Seattle. "I often thought I might die before I knew."
Lee Lundquist remembers with "photographic clarity" the day he learned, at age 10, that his big sister wasn't coming home. He's always believed her killer would be found. He needed to believe it, he said.
"I've known for a long time that finding out who did this to Sara certainly would not make the loss any less severe," he said. "But knowing would certainly help by reducing the mystery and unknowns surrounding her case."
On Tuesday, Detective Mike Ciesynski, who investigates Seattle's "cold cases," paid Williams a visit in a Minnesota prison where more than 400 Washington inmates are being housed. The 62-year-old man -- who has a chance for parole in less than eight years -- insisted he didn't kill the woman he's convicted of murdering and had nothing to say about Lundquist's death, he said.
Ciesynski said he wants to make sure Williams doesn't kill anyone else.
"Here are two girls who were killed in a similar way, two months apart. They were similar in appearance. Both were abducted," he said. "It's my personal belief that a serial murderer will not just stop because he's 60 years old. Once he's released, he'll do it again."
'Totally random'
It was the year the historic Camp David Accords were signed and serial killer Ted
Bundy was finally caught. The U.S. Mint began cranking out Susan B. Anthony
dollars, and people were disco-dancing to the Bee Gees.
Sara Lundquist was a blue-eyed Ingraham High School sophomore who taught Sunday school, played piano and practiced steering her mother's car around a Shilshole Bay parking lot, her sights set on a driver's license.
On July 2, 1978, she and a girlfriend saw a movie downtown and took the bus back home to Ballard. She was last seen walking from the bus stop toward her house on 20th Avenue Northwest. Her body was found the next day in the men's room of a gas station on Leary Avenue, more than a mile away. She'd been stabbed in the neck, chest and head.
Police concluded she'd almost made it home. A neighbor reported hearing a scream and the screech of tires. Lundquist's purse and clogs turned up in an alley.
At the time, police made a public plea for clues. Her father and others later offered a $5,000 reward for information, but the case eventually reached a dead end.
Her family was devastated. Over the years, Carlson said, she has continually agonized over who could have done it and became suspicious of many.
She and her brother, Jim Abbott, said living with heartache, fear and uncertainty simply became part of life. Now, Abbott said, they are trying to accept that "as far as we know, it was totally random."
DNA profile finds match
Ciesynski began looking into the girl's unsolved killing after a call a few years ago from Lundquist's brother, who'd occasionally checked with police over the years.
He tracked down old reports and remnants of the investigation: The denim outfit Lundquist had worn -- a ticket stub for "Damien: Omen II" still tucked into a pocket -- and the key: microscopic evidence that she may have been sexually assaulted.
He sent the evidence, found inside the girl's clothing, to the Washington State Patrol Crime Lab, where scientists and today's DNA technology revealed a genetic profile. They entered it in a database of convicted felons' profiles last year and found a match with Williams, Ciesynski said.
To read the rest of the article,
click here: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/336600_cold24.htmlMaritime Missy
posted by John Allore @ 11/24/2007 02:26:00 PM
7 comments
7 Comments:
John's question: "Were these Theresa's clothes?" Two possible answers to that question: No...and, yes. If the answer is yes, then there is still another question to ask...where are the rest of her clothes? If the hunters found a shirt and a pair of pants, then where is the long cardigan that she was reported to be wearing that day? Is there a picture of it that can be posted? And, of course, her Chinese shoes, where did they end up?
Has someone seen these items? Was the cardigan new enough to be presented to a female friend, relative, as a Christmas present that year? It's just not DNA that catches criminals.
Her scarf? Found in the field, torn in two...is this part of the evidence that has been mis-placed or thrown out? It could have yielded some DNA if it was used by the killer to strangle her, his sweat and skin particles would be on it because of this action.
So there's more than one place to be looking for these items.
ANON...again...excellent points. I have photos of a sweater coat and chinese slippers from the 1970s. I wanted to post them but I want to confirm they are the correct style. (I wouldn't want to place an erroneous image in anybody's mind.) Maybe I'll just say the photos COULD be similar to the style of clothes that Theresa was wearing when she went missing.
Another question about the missing clothes...if the items that the hunters found were indeed Theresa's clothes...why were they found so far away from Theresa's final resting place? Could it be that she was taken to the Lake Memphremagog area first and killed there? Or was it the other way around. She was killed near where her body was found and the clothes were discarded afterwards? (I'm inclined to believe she was killed near Austin, then transported to the Compton Station Road.)
The sweater...well, I would run the picture by Andre first; he saw her wearing it that day. Ditto for the shoes.
anon
Yes, Austin...I have juggled this one in my head. It would be highly coincidental that not even 36 hours after a young girl disappears, clothing similar to the ones she was wearing when last seen, and missing from her body and surroundings when she was found, were spotted in the woods. As the killer chose where she would be left, I think he also chose the place to leave some of her belongings. These woods meant something to him, OR because of another local and fairly recent crime nearby, he left certain items in Austin trying to tie the two crimes together.
Now, the question of where was Theresa killed (or almost killed) before being left in the Compton Station bog...I'm apt to think that it was in the Compton area, not too far from where she was abducted. It would be chancy to drive all the way to Austin with an unwilling passenger, commit the crime quite a ways in the woods, leave some clothing there, carry Theresa's body all the way back to his car and then drive back to Compton, near the point of the abduction, and dispose of her body. Why not just leave her in the woods with her clothing? Why not leave her there to tied in to that other nearby crime? No, I think the crime took place near the abduction site, then her body left in the bog, then the clothes taken to the woods in Austin. And, of course, the wallet thrown out the car window, on MacDonald Road.
Now, the wallet...I know that John conducted the experiment of leaving it outside in the elements for many months, and I think that this showed that the wallet could withstand the elements. However, and I wrote an email to John after he posted this last year, I don't think that the contents of the wallet would have faired so well. The paper items surely would have suffered some water damage from November to April, yes? no? I could be wrong, but I think that the wallet was discarded after Theresa was found. This is my opinion and IF it is correct, that means a very bright red wallet was in someone's possession, for over 5 months... Maybe it was spotted in someone's car, the trunk maybe; or at home, in someone's dresser...how odd to see that there...
And then again, the place where it was found...near the site of an attempted assault, coincidence?
Hi,
I found your blog because I'm a friend of Sara Lundquist's brother.
I'm so sorry for what you've been going through all these years. I was honestly shocked when the police found Sara's killer after all this time. I bookmarked your site and wish you all the best. May justice finally be served. - e
POLLY...Thanks for stopping by! Sara's story is inspirational and if the police had kept Theresa's clothes as evidence, there might have been no need for this blog. Unfortunately, Theresa's case is riddled with unaswered questions, incompetent investigative work and general apathy by the Quebec justice system. But maybe, one day, the Allore family may finally get the justice the Lundquist family recently experienced.
We hope you continue to visit this site and share your thoughts.
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